LIHUE — Arnold Leong knows a lot about waste. The 68-year-old Hanapepe resident, after all, once served as the county’s deputy county engineer and Kauai manager of Browning-Ferris Industries, a now defunct nationwide waste management company. “I’m a jack of all
LIHUE — Arnold Leong knows a lot about waste.
The 68-year-old Hanapepe resident, after all, once served as the county’s deputy county engineer and Kauai manager of Browning-Ferris Industries, a now defunct nationwide waste management company.
“I’m a jack of all trades and a master of none, but I’ve got good training that I’ve been able to put to good use,” Leong said.
It comes as no surprise then that one of his biggest concerns is the county’s solid waste program.
Even so, Leong said, that is not what primarily pushed him to run for a seat on the Kauai County Council. The straw that broke the camel’s back, he said, was the seven-member board’s decision to raise a number of taxes and fees during this year’s budget session.
Leong said he was specifically troubled by the non-residential tipping fee hikes approved last month to help balance the county’s budget and the trickle-down effect it will likely have on island residents.
“They say it’s more for the hotels and other businesses, but when you think about it, if you have a party or wedding or something, where can you go anymore,” Leong said. “You know, there are no local-style restaurants, so you end up in a hotel. They have to make sure they can cover their expenses, so down the road, we all pay for everything. But one of the things that bothers me is that the county has a mindset on one path, and one path alone, and they’re not willing to look at other options.”
If elected, Leong said he would like to look at pyrolyzation, the anaerobic decomposition of organic material at high temperatures, as a viable disposal option for county waste rather than just finding a new site for a landfill — a process that he called a “negative revenue operation.”
“You only put money into it and you don’t get any money out,” Leong said.
The retiree and part-time employee of SSFM International, a Honolulu-based engineering firm with an office in Lihue, said he would also like to take another look at the county’s recycling programs, which can be expensive to operate.
He said BFI officials saved by cutting costs at pennies per pound, which added up to tens of thousands of dollars.
“That’s the same thing the county needs to do,” Leong said. “They need to see where they’re wasting money, where they’re wasting time, and do something different.”
